As I write this, I am waiting on my interviewer. It´s for a Junior Consultant position in an Atlanta-based management consultancy firm. It was last Wednesday when I got the call. Was happy to know that I had made the firm´s callback list. After I hung up, I went over my most ingenious remarks of the first interview and congratulated myself. But back to reality. The appointment was at 12.00 and it is now 12.15. Where the hell is Mr. Clarke?

I am sitting in a beautifully decorated meeting room. By the window of the impressive modern building, overlooking the busiest part of town, I see the books that made the founders of the firm famous for their innovative approach to strategy execution. I do not see the latest title by the authors, the one I tried to find at my local bookshop and had been ordered but not delivered yet. No use worrying about it now.

Through half-open sliding doors I see a second meeting room, this one slightly more informal, with a writing board, hanging maps and several grey leather chairs. I imagine they use this one for internal meetings, while they meet with clients in this one.On the glass table in front of me is a plate full of candy and sweets. They look great. Soft, would not be hard to chew and could be swallowed fast. Gosh I´m hungry. I overslept and had to skip breakfast. Had a mint though. A sophisticated telephone for conference calling is also at the table. It is aerodynamic and shaped like a boomerang. What were those designers thinking?

What looks like an expresso coffee machine sits at a corner table. Someone is outside the room, Mr Clarke? My heart races and I raise from the chair. I see someone go by. He doesn´t look like Mr. Clarke, although I´ve never met him. I strain to hear the secretary talking on the phone. She informs Mr. Clarke that I am waiting for him. She listens and understands the situation. She will let me know. She laughs a little (a little cynicism?) and goes on to make a second call. She follows his instructions and postpones Mr. Clarke´s appointment with the person on the other end of the receiver (my competitor?) until 1. 15.

It is now 12.30. Assuming another 15 minutes of delay, my interview could only last half an hour. I don´t like this one bit. I know what´s coming. Susan comes in the room and is sorry to let me know that Mr. Clarke will take a few more minutes to arrive, as he is held up in a meeting with a client. She looks and sounds sincere and I believe her. She offers me something to drink, but I have a knot in my stomach. She is back on the phone – arrangements concerning a flight to London.

I have now been waiting for 50 minutes, counting the 10 for arriving early. I secretly curse at the widespread advice about arriving on time to interviews and –even better- a few minutes early. The sweets look great. Someone whistles. Mr Clarke? I don´t think that´s his style. I feel watched.

There is a video recording device hanging from the roof and facing me. I don´t think anyone is watching my movements. Can it read small print? I push this thought away as it makes me even more nervous. My handshake will be firm, but not too strong. I will introduce myself and thank the interviewer for his time. No, of course I didn´t mind the wait. I won´t ask him why it´s taken a month for them to call back after the first interview, although I wonder.

I will cut the description of my work experience to 3 minutes. The sales and marketing experience is not too relevant, but I will mention the government work as government agencies are big clients of theirs. I hear footsteps and my heart beats faster again.. Someone coughs. I believe my background in tax administration is ideal for consulting as it has furnished me with powerful analytical skills and an understanding of business accounting practices and deals. Oh my God here he is.

I was sitting in a teacher’s assistant training session years ago, and the director of the training, a long-time tenured professor, posed a question, seemingly on impulse, that got everyone in the room thinking. His question was: Ultimately, what is your job as a teacher? After several responses from my peers, I tried my hand. My answer?

My job is to equip others with the ability to make better choices.

(The fact that I knew this caused his mouth to drop wide-open.) To this day, I am more convinced than ever that helping others make better choices is a primary hallmark of the exceptional educator, the exceptional employee, and the exceptional leader. Interestingly, research has repeatedly confirmed this fact.

William Glasser’s work is worth noting along this line. Glasser, a noted-psychiatrist, lecturer, and widely-published author, contends that the quality of our lives are determined not by our circumstances, but by our choices. Specifically, the decisions we make regarding what we think and how we act dictate our feelings and make-up: to put it succinctly, our world.

In brief, it doesn’t pay to blame any thing or any one else for your state in life. You are the captain of your own ship. You decide what to think. You decide how to act. You decide your journey.

Why address this now? Because it’s easy to get lost in a riptide of bad economic news. These are uncertain times, and it’s easy to let the events define you. Instead, remember, you have the power to define the events. You have the ability to plot the course to your next port of call. When you take this mindset, you will make better choices, and you will provide an example worthy for others to follow.

About the Author:

Dr. Philip Aust is a professor at Kennesaw State University (KSU). He teaches Organizational Communication Audits, Leadership, Training and Development, and Research Methods in the Department of Communication at KSU.

Dr. Aust regularly conducts communication consultations for profit and non-profit Atlanta-based companies. He has worked with over 25 companies in the last three years.

He was a cool guy. Had a nice chat. And three days later I am in the paper.

A few hours into the day and into the next days I had quite a few cool email including old friends I had not seen/heard from in years including a guy I sat near in home room in high school for four years who now lives in Tennessee.

Some day I will be able to tell my kids (need a girlfriend and then wife to make that happen) one day about how I was named in an article with:

Who knows if my then kids will find this cool but for a couple of days I did.

The second article was September 26th, 2008 in this Minneapolis/St. Paul Business Journal article Sites: not just for personal connections anymore. The article is about how social networking sites are not just for social purposes but also a business tool.

I am including my quotes below because I am not sure how long this link will work:

Recruiters, too, are increasingly turning to social-networking sites to find job candidates, said Paul DeBettignies, managing partner at Nerd Search, a Minneapolis-based tech recruiting firm. And they’re not just looking at LinkedIn; Twitter — a “micro-blogging” tool that lets people dispatch 140-character messages or “tweets” that can be shared with fellow users — is especially popular in the tech crowd, and fertile ground for IT recruiters.

“The idea is you should probably go where your talent pool is,” DeBettignies said. “If you’re an IT person, you want to go on Twitter. If you’re in marketing, get on Facebook.”

About 85 percent of employers use Facebook to either find candidates or do quick background searches on prospective hires, DeBettignies said. The technique is especially popular with recruiters who are competing for strong intern candidates.

And:

“The hard sell is dead,” Boardman said. “It doesn’t work door-to-door, and it doesn’t work on social networks.”

That’s a rule followed by many savvy recruiters, DeBettignies said. “What some recruiters do is become a bull in a China shop and start spamming people. Then it’s like fishing — they all scatter and don’t come back for a while.”

After being a part of many national and local conversations regarding hiring, the economy, and the credit market crisis it seemed to be a good time for me to do a survey of the Minnesota Recruiters group.

The survey is unscientific but does give a good reading on what local corporate, search and consulting firm recruiters are experiencing and how they see the job market into 2009.

SurveyMonkey was used to collect responses. Approximately 1,150 received the survey link. Within a few percentage points the category of recruiter mirrors that of the email list. 338 started and 300 completed the survey between October 8-10, 2008:

Corporate Recruiter

42.90%

145

Search Firm Recruiter

29.30%

99

IT Consulting Firm Recruiter

14.20%

48

HR/Recruiter Consulting Firm Recruiter

13.60%

46

Items and thoughts to note:

Generally it appears that our area and companies are doing better in terms of hiring and optimism than other regions.

Generally speaking hiring cycles are becoming longer in terms of process, interviews, and back ground checks. Many times the word “deliberate” has been used to suggest companies are being very specific on who they hire.

Generally speaking most Recruiters say that even if not hiring in an area, if a very talented candidate contacted them there is a good chance they would be hired.

The Corporate Recruiters who did the survey like the Corporate Recruiters on the email list are 80% in a large company category. It does seem at this time larger companies are feeling the economic issues more than small and mid size companies.

There are signs from the survey and through conversations that small and mid size companies are continuing to hire at a slightly slower pace. Only a little slow down has been seen with small to mid size companies.

On a national level conversations are that one need to analyze regions and industries separately as there are many areas of strength and weakness in the economy.

On our local level this too is seen. Some industries are doing better than others. Saying that there is evidence that at the company level each situation is different. For example, one healthcare company is not hiring IT, Marketing or Recruiter staff but another company down the road is.

Suggestions for the next survey(s) of this kind have been to add:

Recruiter role as in VP, Manager, Recruiter, Sourcer

Add 2 categories “Not Hiring” “Staff Reductions”. While the number of those who would have used those terms in their answers for this survey is very small if we continue to see the job market deteriorate then they will be needed in future surveys

If you have any questions, comments, suggestions about the survey please send me an email:

But there are plenty of copywriters who earn more than $500,000 per year and $50,000 per letter.

They get this kind of money for writing sales letters that sell in the millions of dollars.

And, since your job search is ultimately a sales and marketing campaign, why not take your cover letter cues from the letters written by highly paid copywriters?Here are four ways to do it ...

1) Begin with a NameWhen's the last time you bought something from a sales letter that began, "Dear Occupant"?

I thought so.

Why not?

Because, if the writer doesn't even know your name, how are they going to understand your situation enough to deserve getting your hard-earned money?

Employers think the same way.

Why should they give you their money -- in the form of salary -- if you start your cover letter, "Dear Sir or Madam"?

So, it behooves you to start every cover letter with the name of the hiring authority. Make as many phone calls as it takes to find that person's name.

Here's a script to use when you call: "I'm writing a letter to the head of your Accounting/Customer Service/Warehousing Department. Could I have the correct spelling for that person's name please?"

2) Know Your Reader, Then Prove ItYour cover letter should show that you researched the employer. The more relevant, specific facts you can include in your letter, the better your odds that at least one of them will connect with the reader.

Every company hiring has problems to solve and opportunities to capitalize on.

Find them by asking the people you know personally and professionally. Good places to start are your email address book, followed by Linkedin.com. You can also try Facebook, MySpace and Zoominfo.com.

Google can provide a mountain of intelligence. Your main task will be to prioritize which facts to include and which to leave out of your cover letter.

In fact, if you don't have room for everything, that can be good!

In your cover letter, include two or three relevant bits of information from your research, then language to this effect: "There isn't room here to discuss all the ways I can contribute to ABC Corp., so please call me today to learn four more areas I can help you with, including the $750,000 opportunity mentioned in yesterday's New York Times."

3) Turn I, Me, My into You, You, YouRead any good sales letter and one of the most common words will always be YOU.

That's because good copywriters understand human nature, and how natural it is to be selfish. We care about ourselves first and foremost.

And, because hiring managers are human, they care more about themselves and their problems than about you and yours.

With that in mind, you can instantly improve any cover letters by making one, simple change: Turn all the mentions of "I, me, mine" into "you, You, YOU."

Example: Don't write, "I'm applying for a job where my skills will be rewarded with the opportunity for me to advance."Blech.

Write this: "You will benefit from my 11 years of accounting experience, which will help make a rapid contribution for your clients and your bottom line."

4) End with a Call for ActionThe best sales letters don't just peter out with language like, "Please drop us a line if you like our product."Instead, they ask for specific action, NOW.

Here's the closing from a letter selling mini-trampolines (I bought one, by the way): "Seeing is believing, so send for your Tramp-o-matic 3000 today."

And here's one from a letter selling business book summaries (I bought this one, too): "One quick toll-free phone call -- 1-800-123.4567 -- or an online click to www.abc.net -- and we'll get your first two summaries off to you, plus your eight bonus summaries."

Need more ideas?

Here's a closing you can adapt to your needs: "Please call me today at 555-1212 and I'll tell you how the same sales skills that helped me produce $235,890 in revenue last quarter can quickly boost profits for you."

Or this: "Please call me today at 555-1212 and I'll explain how the same accounting skills that helped me save $35,950 in taxes last quarter can increase profits for you."

About & Connect

Welcome to the Minnesota Headhunter Blog. My name is Paul DeBettignies (pronounced De-Bett-ingz). I started writing in 2005 to share thoughts and ideas I had as an IT recruiter.

Since then I expanded this site to include MN IT and Recruiter Jobs, links to Minnesota business news and promote the local tech community.

I am the Principal of Minnesota Headhunter, LLC. I am an Evangelist and Advisor who builds teams with startups and tech companies, creates recruiting strategies for Fortune 500 clients and a frequent local and national speaker and article contributor on recruiter, HR, career, networking and social media topics.